document_title: Steel Magnolias

question_text: who did shirley maclaine play in steel magnolias

text: Steel Magnolias

text: Plot[edit]

text: Annelle Dupuy, a reserved beauty school graduate, is hired by Truvy Jones to work in her home-based beauty salon in northwestern Louisiana. At the same time, in another part of the neighborhood, M'Lynn Eatenton, and her daughter, Shelby, are preparing for Shelby's wedding, which is taking place later that day. They arrive, along with Clairee Belcher, the cheerful widow of the former mayor, to have their hair done. Suddenly, Shelby, who has type 1 diabetes, falls into a hypoglycemic state, but recovers quickly with the help of her mother's quick thinking. Later that afternoon, short-tempered, grouchy, and sarcastic Louisa "Ouiser" Boudreaux arrives in the salon and questions Annelle about where she has moved from, forcing Annelle to reveal that her husband has recently left her while fleeing the police, taking all their money and their car. Moved by Annelle's emotional confession, Shelby invites her to the wedding, where Annelle meets Sammy, who is tending bar.

text: Several months pass and Shelby returns to town to celebrate Christmas. During the festivities, she announces that she and her husband, Jackson Latcherie, are expecting their first child. Shelby's father Drum is thrilled, but M'Lynn is too worried to share in the joy. Truvy, Annelle, and Clairee had originally thought that Shelby couldn't have children, but on the night of the big announcement, M'Lynn clarifies for them that the doctors said Shelby shouldn't have children because of her health. It becomes clear that Shelby could actually die due to pregnancy complications related to her diabetes. Unable to give her any words of wisdom, Truvy suggests they focus on the joy of the situation: Jackson and Shelby's first child, as well as Drum and M'Lynn's first grandchild, as well as their sons, Jonathan and Tommy's, first niece or nephew. M'Lynn agrees, saying that nothing pleases Shelby more than proving her wrong.

text: Shelby successfully delivers a baby boy, Jackson Jr., but begins showing signs of kidney failure and starts dialysis around the time Jackson Jr. turns one. M'Lynn successfully donates a kidney and Shelby seemingly resumes a normal life. Clairee and Ouiser offer to make sure that M'Lynn's husband, Drum, Jonathan, and Tommy have enough food to last until M'Lynn returns home after the transplant. Later, on Halloween, Ouiser, Clairee, Truvy, and M'Lynn throw Annelle a surprise wedding shower, as she is now engaged to Sammy. Shelby is unavailable to attend due to a conflicting schedule with her nursing job, and is later found by Jackson unconscious on the porch of her house. Shelby is rushed to the hospital, where it is determined that her body rejected the new kidney, and she is now in a coma. The doctors inform the family that Shelby is likely to remain comatose indefinitely, and they all jointly decide to take her off life support. At the funeral, after the other mourners have left, M'Lynn breaks down in hysterics in front of Ouiser, Clairee, Truvy, and Annelle, but is comforted by them.

text: Later, at the wake, M'Lynn begins to accept her daughter's death and focuses her energy on helping Jackson raise Jackson Jr. Annelle, now married and pregnant, asks M'Lynn if she could name her own baby after Shelby, since Shelby was the reason Annelle and Sammy met. M'Lynn gives her blessings and assures Annelle that Shelby would've loved it. Months later, on Easter morning, Annelle goes into labor during an Easter egg hunt, is rushed to the hospital by Truvy and her husband Spud, and another life begins.

text: Cast[edit]

text:
Actor
Character
Relationship

Sally Field
Mary Lynn "M'Lynn" Eatenton
Social Worker; Wife to Drum Eatenton; Mother to Shelby, Jonathan and Tommy; Jackson's mother-in-law; Jack Jr.'s maternal grandmother

Dolly Parton
Truvy Jones
Beautician; Wife to Spud Jones; Mother to Louie; town gossip

Shirley MacLaine
Louisa "Ouiser" Boudreaux
Clairee Belcher's best friend and confidant; Eatenton Family's next-door neighbor; town curmudgeon, and Drum Eatenton's nemesis

Daryl Hannah
Annelle Dupuy Desoto
Newcomer to town; Apprentice Beautician hired by Truvy Jones; first married to Bunkie Dupuy; later marries Sammy Desoto

Olympia Dukakis
Clairee Belcher
Former town first lady; sister to Drew Marmillion, sister-in-law to Belle Marmillion; aunt to Marshall and Nancy Beth Marmillion; best friend and confidant of Ouiser Boudreaux; friend of the Eatentons and Joneses

Julia Roberts
Shelby Eatenton Latcherie
Eldest child and only daughter of Drum and M'Lynn Eatenton; sister to Jonathan and Tommy; marries Jackson Latcherie and gives birth to Jackson "Jack" Latcherie, Jr.; suffers from type one diabetes

Tom Skerritt
Thomas Drummond "Drum" Eatenton
Husband of M'Lynn Eatenton, Father to Shelby, Jonathan and Tommy; Jackson Latcherie's father-in-law; Jack Jr.'s maternal grandfather

Sam Shepard
Spud Jones
Sporadically employed laborer; Truvy Jones's husband and Louie's father

Dylan McDermott
Jackson Latcherie
Lawyer; Shelby Eatenton's husband; Jack Jr.'s father; Drum and M'Lynn's son-in-law and Jonathan and Tommy's brother-in-law

Kevin J. O'Connor
Sammy Desoto
Annelle Dupuy's eventual husband, who met her at Shelby and Jackson's wedding reception

Bill McCutcheon
Owen Jenkins
Ouiser Boudreaux's former boyfriend who has returned to town

Ann Wedgeworth
Aunt Fern Thornton
Jackson Latcherie's aunt; her specialty is baking animal-shaped cakes

Knowl Johnson
Tommy Eatenton
Drum and M'Lynn Eatenton's first-born son and middle child; Shelby and Jonathan's brother; Jackson's brother-in-law; Jack Jr.'s maternal uncle

Jonathan Ward
Jonathan Eatenton
Drum and M'Lynn Eatenton's second-born son and youngest child; Shelby and Tommy's brother; Jackson's brother-in-law; Jack Jr.'s maternal uncle

Ronald Young
Drew Marmillion
Clairee Belcher's brother; Husband to Belle Marmillion; Father to Marshall and Nancy Beth

Bibi Besch
Belle Marmillion
Drew Marmillion's wife; Mother to Marshall and Nancy Beth; Clairee Belcher's sister-in-law

Janine Turner
Nancy-Beth Marmillion
Drew and Belle Marmillion's daughter; Marshall's sister; Clairee Belcher's niece; town's dethroned "Miss Merry Christmas"

James Wlcek
Marshall Marmillion
Drew and Belle Marmillion's son; Nancy Beth's brother; Clairee Belcher's nephew; announces to his parents he is gay

Tom Hodges
Louie Jones
Truvy and Spud Jones's rebellious son

C. Houser
Jackson Latcherie, Jr. (1 year old)
Jackson and Shelby Latcherie's son; Drum and M'Lynn Eatenton's maternal grandson; Jonathan and Tommy Eatenton's maternal nephew

Daniel Camp
Jackson Latcherie, Jr. (3 years old)
Jackson and Shelby Latcherie's son; Drum and M'Lynn Eatenton's maternal grandson; Jonathan and Tommy Eatenton's maternal nephew

text: Background[edit]

text: The original play dramatized experiences of the family and friends of the play's author following the 1985 death of his sister from diabetic complications after the birth of his namesake nephew and the failure of a family member's donated kidney. A writer friend continuously encouraged him to write it down in order to come to terms with the experience. He did but originally as a short story for his nephew then later to get an understanding of the deceased mother. It evolved in ten days into the play.[4][5]

text: Production[edit]

text: Released by TriStar Pictures in the United States on November 15, 1989 and grossed more than $83.7 million at the box office. Harling's first produced screenplay, he adapted the original film script which was then heavily rewritten beyond the on-stage one-set scenario (which had taken place entirely in Truvy's beauty salon) of the stage production: the scenes increased and the sequence was more tightly linked with major holidays than the play; the increased characters beyond the original, all-female play cast caused dialogue changes between on-screen characters (among them, Harling playing the preacher and Truvy has one son instead of two). Natchitoches, Louisiana served as both the 1989 film location and scenario location[6] with historian Robert DeBlieux, a former Natchitoches mayor, as the local advisor.[7]

text: Reception[edit]

text: It received generally positive reviews from critics and has a score of 69% on Rotten Tomatoes.[8] An example of a less enthusiastic critic was Hal Hinson of The Washington Post, who said that it felt, "more Hollywood than the South."[9] More enthusiastic was Roger Ebert, who said that the film was, "willing to sacrifice its over-all impact for individual moments of humor, and while that leaves us without much to take home, you've got to hand it to them: The moments work."[10][11]

text: The movie received a limited release on November 15, 1989: entered the U.S. box office at No. 4 with an opening weekend gross of $5,425,440; by the time of wider release two days later it grossed $15,643,935; stayed in the top 10 for 16 weeks, gross $83,759,091 domestically with a further $12,145,000 with foreign markets giving a worldwide gross of $95,904,091.[12]

text: Home media[edit]

text: The film was released on VHS on June 19, 1990 and on DVD July 25, 2000, allowing the film to gross a further $40 million.[13][14] The movie's overall gross was $135,904,091. The film was released on Blu-ray through the boutique label Twilight Time, on September 11, 2012–it has since gone out of print.

text: Awards and nominations[edit]

text:
Year
Association
Category
Nominated work
Result

1990
Academy Awards
Best Supporting Actress
Julia Roberts
Nominated

1990
American Comedy Awards
Funniest Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture
Olympia Dukakis
Nominated

1990
American Comedy Awards
Funniest Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture
Shirley MacLaine
Nominated

1990
Chicago Film Critics Association Awards
Best Supporting Actress
Shirley MacLaine
Nominated

1990
Golden Globe Awards
Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama
Sally Field
Nominated

1990
Golden Globe Awards
Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture
Julia Roberts
Won

1990
People's Choice Awards
Favorite Dramatic Motion Picture
Steel Magnolias
Won

1991
BAFTA Awards
Best Actress in a Supporting Role
Shirley MacLaine
Nominated

text: Failed TV sequel pilot[edit]

text: CBS broadcast on August 17, 1990, a half-hour television pilot sitcom sans Shelby's character as the story line was post death. The cast included Cindy Williams as M'Lynn, Sally Kirkland as Truvy, Elaine Stritch as Ouiser, Polly Bergen as Clairee and Sheila McCarthy as Annelle.

text: Remake[edit]

text: Lifetime Television Network announced (October 10, 2011) a planned remake under the direction of Kenny Leon, director of the ABC movie A Raisin in the Sun (2008), set in Louisiana[15] featuring lead role black actors: Queen Latifah (M'Lynn), Jill Scott (Truvy), Alfre Woodard (Ouiser), Phylicia Rashād (Clairee), Adepero Oduye (Annelle) and Condola Rashād (Shelby).[16][17] The New York Times had mixed reactions: applauded it on some points and on others as either schmaltz or less attentive than the 1989 film.[18]


document_title: The Handmaid's Tale

question_text: what is an eye in hand maids tale

question_tokens: what is an eye in hand maids tale

root

text: The Handmaid's Tale

text: Plot summary[edit]

text: The Handmaid's Tale is set in the Republic of Gilead, a theonomic military dictatorship formed within the borders of what was formerly the United States of America.[5]

tag: p

text: Beginning with a staged attack that kills the President and most of Congress, a fundamentalist Christian Reconstructionist movement calling itself the "Sons of Jacob" launches a revolution and suspends the United States Constitution under the pretext of restoring order.[7] They are quickly able to take away women's rights, largely attributed to financial records being stored electronically and labelled by sex. The new regime, the Republic of Gilead, moves quickly to consolidate its power and reorganize society along a new militarized, hierarchical model of Old Testament-inspired social and religious fanaticism among its newly created social classes. In this society, human rights are severely limited and women's rights are even more curtailed; for example, women are forbidden to read.

text: The story is told in the first person by a woman called Offred. She has an odd name which is explained as the book progresses. The character is one of a class of women kept for reproductive purposes and known as "handmaids" by the ruling class in an era of declining births due to sterility from pollution and sexually transmitted diseases. Offred describes her life during her third assignment as a handmaid, in this case to Fred (referred to as "The Commander"). Interspersed in flashbacks are portions of her life from before and during the beginning of the revolution, when she finds she has lost all autonomy to her husband, through her failed attempt to escape with her husband and daughter to Canada, to her indoctrination into life as a handmaid. Offred describes the structure of Gilead's society, including the several different classes of women and their circumscribed lives in the new theonomy.

text: The Commander is a high-ranking official in Gilead. Although he is supposed to have contact with Offred only during "the ceremony", a ritual of sexual intercourse intended to result in conception and at which his wife is present, he begins an illegal and ambiguous relationship with her. He offers her hidden or contraband products, such as old (1970s) fashion magazines, cosmetics and clothes, takes her to a secret brothel run by the government, and furtively meets with her in his study, where he allows her to read, an activity otherwise prohibited for women. The Commander's wife, Serena Joy, also has secret interactions with Offred, arranging for her secretly to have sex with Nick, the Commander's driver, in an effort to get Offred pregnant. In exchange for Offred's cooperation, Serena Joy gives her news of her daughter, whom Offred has not seen since she and her family were captured trying to escape Gilead.

text: After Offred's initial meeting with Nick, they begin to meet more frequently. Offred discovers she enjoys sex with Nick, despite her indoctrination and her memories of her husband. She shares potentially dangerous information about her past with him. Through another handmaid, Ofglen, Offred learns of the Mayday resistance, an underground network working to overthrow Gilead. Shortly after Ofglen's disappearance (later revealed as a suicide), the Commander's wife finds evidence of the relationship between Offred and the Commander. Offred contemplates suicide. As the novel concludes, she is being taken away by the secret police, the Eyes of God, known informally as "the Eyes", under orders from Nick. Before she is put in the large black van, Nick tells her that the men are part of the Mayday resistance and that Offred must trust him. Offred does not know if Nick is a member of the Mayday resistance or a government agent posing as one, and she does not know if going with the men will result in her escape or her capture. She enters the van with her future uncertain.

text: The novel concludes with a metafictional epilogue that explains that the events of the novel occurred shortly after the beginning of what is called "the Gilead Period". The epilogue is "a partial transcript of the proceedings of the Twelfth Symposium on Gileadean Studies" written in 2195. According to the symposium's "keynote speaker" Professor Pieixoto, he and his colleague Professor Knotly Wade discovered Offred's story recorded onto cassette tapes. They transcribed the tapes, calling them collectively "the handmaid's tale". Through the tone and actions of the professionals in this final section of the book, the world of academia is highlighted and critiqued, and Pieixoto discusses his team's search for the characters named in the Tale, and the impossibility of proving the tapes' authenticity.[8] Nevertheless, the epilogue implies that, following the collapse of the theonomic Republic of Gilead, a more equal society—though not the United States that previously existed—re-emerged, with a restoration of full rights for women and freedom of religion.

text: Characters[edit]

text: Offred[edit]

text: Offred is the protagonist and narrator. She was labeled a "wanton woman" when Gilead was established because she had married a man who was divorced. All divorces were nullified by the new government, meaning her husband was now considered still married to his first wife, making Offred an adulteress. In trying to escape Gilead, she was separated from her husband and daughter. She is part of the first generation of Gilead's women, those who remember pre-Gilead times. Proved fertile, she is considered an important commodity and has been placed as a handmaid in the home of the Commander Fred and his wife Serena Joy, to bear a child for them (Serena Joy is believed to be infertile).[9]

text: Offred is a slave name that describes her function: she is "of Fred", i.e. she belongs to Fred, her commander, and is considered a concubine. In the novel, Offred says that she is not a concubine, but a tool; a "two legged womb". The Handmaids' names say nothing about who the women really are (Offred Of Fred, Ofglen Of Glen); their only identity is as the Commander's property. "Offred" is also pun on the word "offered", as in "offered as a sacrifice". And it is a play on the words "off-red", referencing the color that handmaids wear and the character's frustrations with her assigned position.[6] It is implied that her birth name is June. The women in training to be handmaids whisper names across their beds at night. The names are "Alma. Janine. Dolores. Moira. June", and all are later accounted for except June. In addition, one of the Aunts tells the handmaids-in-training to stop "mooning and June-ing".[10] Miner suggests that "June" is a pseudonym. As "Mayday" is the name of the Gilead resistance, June could be an invention by the protagonist. The Nunavit conference covered in the epilogue takes place in June.[11] Atwood wrote that it was not her original intention to imply that Offred's real name is June "but it fits, so readers are welcome to it if they wish."[6]

text: The Commander[edit]

text: The Commander says that he is a sort of scientist and was previously involved in something similar to market research, pre-Gilead. Later, it is hypothesized, but not confirmed, that he might have been one of the architects of the Republic and its laws. Presumably, his first name is "Fred", though that, too, may be a pseudonym.

text: He engages in forbidden intellectual pursuits with Offred, such as playing Scrabble, and introduces her to a secret club that serves as a brothel for high-ranking officers. Offred learns that the Commander carried on a similar relationship with his previous handmaid and that she killed herself when his wife found out. In the epilogue the academics speculate that one of two figures, both instrumental in the establishment of Gilead, may have been Fred, based on his first name. It is strongly suggested that the Commander was a man named Frederick R. Waterford who was killed in a purge shortly after Offred was taken away, charged with harboring an enemy agent.

text: Serena Joy[edit]

text: Serena Joy is a former televangelist and the Commander's wife in the fundamentalist theonomy. The state took away her power and public recognition, and tries to hide her past as a television figure. Offred identifies her master's wife by recalling seeing her on TV when she was a little girl early on Saturday mornings while waiting for the cartoons to air. Believed to be sterile (although the suggestion is made that the Commander is sterile - Gileadean laws attribute sterility only to women), she is forced to accept that he has use of a handmaid. She resents having to take part in the monthly fertility ritual. She strikes a deal with Offred to arrange for her to have sex with Nick in order to become pregnant. According to Professor Pieixoto in the epilogue, "Serena Joy" or "Pam" are pseudonyms; the character's real name is implied to be Thelma.

text: Ofglen[edit]

text: Ofglen is a neighbour of Offred's and a fellow Handmaid. She is partnered with Offred to do the daily shopping. Handmaids are never alone and are expected to police each other's behaviour. Ofglen is a member of the Mayday resistance. In contrast to Offred, she is daring. She knocks out a Mayday spy who is to be tortured and killed in order to save him the pain of a violent death. Offred is told that when Ofglen vanishes, it is because she has committed suicide before the government can take her into custody due to her membership in the resistance, possibly to avoid giving away any information.

text: A new handmaid, also called Ofglen, takes Ofglen's place, and is assigned as Offred's shopping partner. She threatens Offred against any thought of resistance. She breaks protocol by telling her what happened to the first Ofglen.

text: Nick[edit]

text: Nick is the Commander's chauffeur, who lives above the garage. By Serena Joy's arrangement, he and Offred start a sexual relationship to increase her chance of getting pregnant. If she were unable to bear the Commander a child, she would be declared sterile and shipped to the ecological wastelands of the Colonies. Offred begins to develop feelings for him. Nick is an ambiguous character, and Offred does not know if he is a party loyalist or part of the resistance, though he identifies himself as the former. The epilogue suggests that he really was part of the resistance, and aided Offred in escaping the Commander's house.

text: Moira[edit]

text: Moira has been a close friend of Offred's since college. A lesbian, she has resisted the homophobia of Gilead society. Moira is taken to be a Handmaid soon after Offred. She escapes by stealing an Aunt's pass and clothes but Offred later finds her working as a prostitute in a party-run brothel. She was caught and chose the brothel rather be sent to the Colonies.

text: Luke[edit]

text: Luke was Offred's husband prior to the formation of Gilead. He had divorced his first wife to marry her. Under Gilead, all divorces were retrospectively nullified, resulting in Offred being considered an adulteress and their daughter a bastard. Offred was forced to become a Handmaid and her daughter was given to a loyalist family. Since their attempt to escape to Canada, Offred has heard nothing of Luke.

text: Professor Pieixoto[edit]

text: Pieixoto is the "co-discoverer [with Professor Knotly Wade] of Offred's tapes". He talks in his presentation about "the 'Problems of Authentication in Reference to The Handmaid's Tale'".[9]

text: Setting[edit]

text: The novel is set in an indeterminate future, speculated to be around the year 2005,[12] with a fundamentalist theonomy ruling the territory of what had been the United States but is now the Republic of Gilead. Individuals are segregated by categories and dressed according to their social functions. The complex sumptuary laws (dress codes) play a key role in imposing social control within the new society and serve to distinguish people by sex, occupation, and caste.

text: The action takes place in what once was the Harvard Square neighbourhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts;[13][14] Atwood studied at Radcliffe College, located in this area.

text: Politics[edit]

text: In Gilead, the bodies of fertile women are politicized and controlled. The North American population is falling as more men and women become infertile (though in Gilead, legally, it is only women who can be the cause of infertility). Gilead's treatment of women is based upon what the author portrays as a narrow, fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible, meaning that women are the property of and subordinate to their husband, father, or head of household. They are not allowed to do anything that would grant them any power independent of this system. They are not allowed to vote, hold a job, read, possess money, or own anything, among many other restrictions. A particular quote from The Handmaid's Tale sums this up: "The Republic of Gilead, said Aunt Lydia, knows no bounds. Gilead is within you" (HT 5.2). This describes that there is no way around the societal bounds of women in this new state of government. Handmaids, being not allowed to wed, are given two-year assignments with a commander, and lose their own name: they are called "Of [their Commander's first name]", such as the novel's heroine, known only as Offred. When a handmaid is reassigned, her name changes with her. Their original identities before the revolution are suppressed, although while being reeducated as handmaids, they surreptitiously share their names with each other.

text: In this book, the government appears to be strong though "no one in Gilead seems to be a true believer in its revolution" (Beauchamp). The Commanders, portrayed via Commander Fred, do not agree with their own doctrines. The commander takes Offred at one point to a brothel in order to have sex with her in an informal setting apart from the Ceremony. The wives, portrayed via Serena Joy, former television evangelist, disobey the rules set forth by their commander husbands. Serena smokes black market cigarettes and expresses the forbidden idea that men may be infertile, and schemes to get Offred impregnated by her chauffeur.

text: Religion[edit]

text: Bruce Miller, the executive producer of The Handmaid's Tale television serial, declared with regard to Atwood's book, as well as his series, that Gilead is "a society that’s based kind of in a perverse misreading of Old Testament laws and codes".[15] The author explains that Gilead tries to embody the "utopian idealism" present in 20th-century régimes, such as Cambodia and Romania, as well as earlier New England Puritanism.[16] Both Atwood and Miller stated that the people running Gilead are "not genuinely Christian".[17][15] The group running Gilead, according to Atwood, is "not really interested in religion; they're interested in power."[18] In fact, in her prayers to God, June (Offred), reflecting on Gilead, prays “I don't believe for an instant that what's going on out there is what You meant…. I suppose I should say I forgive whoever did this, and whatever they’re doing now. I’ll try, but it isn’t easy.”[19] Margaret Atwood, writing on this, says that "Offred herself has a private version of the Lord's Prayer and refuses to believe that this regime has been mandated by a just and merciful God."[20] Christian churches that do not support the actions of the Sons of Jacob are systematically demolished, and the people living in Gilead are never seen attending church.[15] Christian denominations, including Quakers, Baptists and Roman Catholics, as well as Jews, are specifically named as enemies of the Sons of Jacob.[18][15] To this end, the book includes a scene in which a Catholic Christian nun is "forced to renounce her vow of chastity in order to become a child-bearing handmaid."[17] Likewise, a Catholic Christian priest was hanged from a bridge for refusing to renounce his faith.[21] Atwood pits Quaker Christians against the régime by having them help the oppressed, something she feels they would do in reality: "The Quakers have gone underground, and are running an escape route to Canada, as—I suspect—they would."[20]

text: Caste and class[edit]

text: African Americans, the main non-white ethnic group in this society, are called the Children of Ham. A state TV broadcast mentions they have been relocated en masse to "National Homelands" in the Midwest, which are suggestive of the Apartheid-era homelands set up by South Africa. Roman Catholics are only briefly mentioned: nuns who refuse conversion are considered "Unwomen" and banished to the Colonies, owing to their reluctance to marry and refusal (or inability) to bear children. Priests unwilling to convert are executed and hanged from the Wall. Jews are called Sons of Jacob, also the name of the fundamentalist group that rules the Republic of Gilead. Offred observes that Jews refusing to convert are allowed to emigrate to Israel, and most choose to leave. However, in the Epilogue, Professor Pieixoto reveals that many of the emigrating Jews ended up being dumped into the sea while on the ships ostensibly tasked with transporting them to Israel, due to privatization of the "repatriation program" and capitalists' effort to maximize profits. Offred mentions that many Jews who chose to stay were caught secretly practicing Judaism and executed.

text: Gender and occupation[edit]

text: The sexes are strictly divided. Gilead's society values reproduction by white women most highly. Women are categorised "hierarchically according to class status and reproductive capacity" as well as "metonymically colour-coded according to their function and their labour" (Kauffman 232). The Commander expresses the prevailing opinion that women are considered intellectually and emotionally inferior to men.

text: Women are segregated by clothing, as are men. With rare exception, men wear military or paramilitary uniforms, which takes away their individualism as it does the women, but also gives them a sense of bravado and empowerment. All classes of men and women are defined by the colours they wear (as in Aldous Huxley's dystopian Brave New World), drawing on colour symbolism and psychology. All lower-status individuals are regulated by this dress code. All non-persons are banished to the "Colonies" (usually forced-labor camps in which they clean up radioactive waste, becoming exposed and dying painful deaths as a result). Sterile, unmarried women are considered to be non-persons. Both men and women sent there wear grey dresses.

text: Women[edit]

text: Six main categories of "legitimate" women make up mainstream society. Two chief categories of "illegitimate" women live outside of mainstream society:

text: Legitimate women[edit]

text: The division of labour among the women generates some resentment. Marthas, Wives and Econowives perceive Handmaids as promiscuous and are taught to scorn them. Offred mourns that the women of the various groups have lost their ability to empathize with each other. They are divided in their oppression.

text: Illegitimate women[edit]

text: Men[edit]

text: Men are classified into four main categories:

text: Men who engage in homosexuality or related acts are declared "Gender Traitors"; they are either hanged or sent to the "colonies" to die a slow death.

text: Babies[edit]

text: In this society, birth defects have become increasingly common.

text: There are two main categories of human children:

text: The Ceremony[edit]

text: "The Ceremony" is a non-marital sexual act sanctioned for reproduction. The ritual requires the Handmaid to lie on her back between the legs of the Wife during the sex act as if they were one person. The Wife has to invite the Handmaid to share her power this way; many Wives consider this both humiliating and offensive. Offred describes the ceremony:

text: My red skirt is hitched up to my waist, though no higher. Below it the Commander is fucking. What he is fucking is the lower part of my body. I do not say making love, because this is not what he's doing. Copulating too would be inaccurate, because it would imply two people and only one is involved. Nor does rape cover it: nothing is going on here that I haven't signed up for.[22]

text: Language[edit]

text: In the novel's fictional fundamentalist society, sterile is an "outlawed" word.[23] In this society, there is no such thing as a sterile man anymore. In this culture, women are either fruitful or barren, the latter of which is declared to be an "unwoman" and is sent to the colonies with the rest of the "unwomen" to do life-threatening work until their death, which is, on average, three years.

text: Atwood emphasises how changes in context affect behaviours and attitudes by repeating the phrase "Context is all" throughout the novel, establishing this precept as a motif.[24] Playing the game of Scrabble with her Commander illustrates the key significance of changes in "context"; once "the game of old men and women", the game became forbidden for women to play and therefore "desirable".[25] Through living in a morally rigid society, Offred has come to perceive the world differently from earlier. Offred expresses amazement at how "It has taken so little time to change our minds about things".[26] Wearing revealing clothes and makeup had been part of her former life, but when she sees Japanese tourists dressed that way, she now feels the women are inappropriately dressed.[26]

text: Offred can read but not translate the phrase "nolite te bastardes carborundorum" carved into the closet wall of her small bedroom; this mock-Latin aphorism signifies "Don't let the bastards grind you down".[27] The significance of this phrase is intensified by the challenges the book has faced, creating a "Mise en abyme" as both the protagonist and the reader decipher subversive texts.

text: Genre classification[edit]

text: In interviews and essays Atwood has discussed generic classification of The Handmaid's Tale as "science fiction" or "speculative fiction", observing:

text: I like to make a distinction between science fiction proper and speculative fiction. For me, the science fiction label belongs on books with things in them that we can't yet do, such as going through a wormhole in space to another universe; and speculative fiction means a work that employs the means already to hand, such as DNA identification and credit cards, and that takes place on Planet Earth. But the terms are fluid.[3]

text: Hugo-winning science fiction critic David Langford observed in a column: "The Handmaid's Tale won the very first Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1987. She's been trying to live this down ever since." He says:

text: Atwood prefers to say that she writes speculative fiction—a term coined by SF author Robert A. Heinlein. As she told the Guardian, "Science fiction has monsters and spaceships; speculative fiction could really happen." She used a subtly different phrasing for New Scientist, "Oryx and Crake is not science fiction. It is fact within fiction. Science fiction is when you have rockets and chemicals." So it was very cruel of New Scientist to describe this interview in the contents list as: "Margaret Atwood explains why science is crucial to her science fiction." ... Play it again, Ms Atwood—this time for the Book-of-the-Month Club: "Oryx and Crake is a speculative fiction, not a science fiction proper. It contains no intergalactic space travel, no teleportation, no Martians." On BBC1 Breakfast News the distinguished author explained that science fiction, as opposed to what she writes, is characterized by "talking squids in outer space".[4]

text: In distinguishing between these genre labels science fiction and speculative fiction, Atwood acknowledges that others may use the terms interchangeably. But she notes her interest in this type of work to explore themes in ways that "realistic fiction" cannot do.[3]

text: Historical context[edit]

text: Fitting with her claims that The Handmaid's Tale is a work of speculative fiction, not science fiction, Atwood's novel offers a satirical view of various social, political, and religious trends of the 1980s United States. Further, Atwood questions what would happen if these trends, and especially "casually held attitudes about women" were taken to their logical end.[28] Atwood continues to argue that all of the scenarios offered in The Handmaid's Tale have actually occurred in real life—in an interview she gave regarding Oryx and Crake, Atwood maintains that "As with The Handmaid's Tale, I didn't put in anything that we haven't already done, we're not already doing, we're seriously trying to do, coupled with trends that are already in progress... So all of those things are real, and therefore the amount of pure invention is close to nil."[29] Atwood was also known to carry around newspaper clippings to her various interviews to support her fiction's basis in reality.[30] Atwood has explained that The Handmaid's Tale is a response to those who claim the oppressive, totalitarian, and religious governments that have taken hold in other countries throughout the years "can't happen here"—but in this work, she has tried to show how such a takeover might play out.[31]

text: Atwood's inspiration for the Republic of Gilead came from her time studying early American Puritans while at Harvard, which she attended on a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship.[28] Atwood argues that the modern view of the Puritans—that they came to America to flee religious persecution in England and set up a religiously tolerant society—is misleading, and that instead, these Puritan leaders wanted to establish a monolithic theocracy where religious dissent would not be accepted.[28] Atwood also had a personal connection to the Puritans, and she dedicates the novel to her own ancestor Mary Webster, who was accused of witchcraft in Puritan New England but survived her hanging.[32] Due to the totalitarian nature of Gileadan society, Atwood, in creating the setting, drew from the "utopian idealism" present in 20th century régimes, such as Cambodia and Romania, as well as earlier New England Puritanism.[16] Atwood has argued that a coup, such as the one depicted in The Handmaid's Tale, would misuse religion in order to achieve its own ends:[33]

text: ... if you wanted to seize power in the US, abolish liberal democracy and set up a dictatorship, how would you go about it? What would be your cover story? It would not resemble any form of communism or socialism: those would be too unpopular... Nations never build apparently radical forms of government on foundations that aren't there already. Thus China replaced a state bureaucracy with a similar state bureaucracy under a different name, the USSR replaced the dreaded imperial secret police with an even more dreaded secret police, and so forth. The deep foundation of the US – so went my thinking – was not the comparatively recent 18th-century Enlightenment structures of the republic, with their talk of equality and their separation of church and state, but the heavy-handed theocracy of 17th-century Puritan New England, with its marked bias against women, which would need only the opportunity of a period of social chaos to reassert itself. Like any theocracy, this one would select a few passages from the Bible to justify its actions, and it would lean heavily towards the Old Testament, not towards the New.[16]

text: Atwood, with respect to those leading Gilead, further stated:[18]

text: I don't consider these people to be Christians because they do not have at the core of their behavior and ideologies what I, in my feeble Canadian way, would consider to be the core of Christianity … and that would be not only love your neighbors but love your enemies. That would also be 'I was sick and you visited me not' and such and such …And that would include also concern for the environment, because you can't love your neighbor or even your enemy, unless you love your neighbor's oxygen, food, and water. You can't love your neighbor or your enemy if you're presuming policies that are going to cause those people to die. … Of course faith can be a force for good and often has been. So faith is a force for good particularly when people are feeling beleaguered and in need of hope. So you can have bad iterations and you can also have the iteration in which people have got too much power and then start abusing it. But that is human behavior, so you can't lay it down to religion. You can find the same in any power situation, such as politics or ideologies that purport to be atheist. Need I mention the former Soviet Union? So it is not a question of religion making people behave badly. It is a question of human beings getting power and then wanting more of it.[18]

text: In the same vein, Atwood also declared that "In the real world today, some religious groups are leading movements for the protection of vulnerable groups, including women."[20] Atwood also draws connections between the ways in which Gilead's leaders maintain their power and other examples of actual totalitarian governments. In her interviews, Atwood offers up Iran and Afghanistan as examples of religious theocracies forcing women out of the public sphere and into their homes, as in Gilead.[30][28] The "state-sanctioned murder of dissidents" was inspired by the Philippines, and the last General Secretary of the Romanian Communist Party Nicolae Ceausescu's obsession with increasing the birth rate led to the strict policing of pregnant women and the outlawing of birth control and abortion.[30] However, Atwood clearly explains that many of these deplorable acts were not just present in other cultures and countries, "but within Western society, and within the 'Christian' tradition itself".[16]

text: The Republic of Gilead struggles with infertility, making Offred's services as a Handmaid vital to producing children and thus reproducing the society. Handmaids themselves are "untouchable", but their ability to signify status is equated to that of slaves or servants throughout history.[16] Atwood connects their concerns with infertility to real-life problems our world faces, such as radiation, chemical pollution, and venereal disease (HIV/AIDS is specifically mentioned in the "Historical Notes" section at the end of the novel, which was a relatively new disease at the time of Atwood's writing whose long-term impact was likely still unknown). Atwood's strong stance on environmental issues and their negative consequences for our society has presented itself in other works such as her MaddAddam trilogy, and refers back to her growing up with biologists and her own scientific curiosity.[34]

text: Critical reception[edit]

text: The Handmaid's Tale was well received by critics, helping to cement Atwood's status as a prominent writer of the 20th century. Not only was the book deemed well-written and compelling, but Atwood's work was notable for sparking intense debates both in and out of academia.[35] Atwood maintains that the Republic of Gilead is only an extrapolation of trends already seen in the United States at the time of her writing, a view supported by other scholars studying The Handmaid's Tale.[36] Indeed, many have placed The Handmaid's Tale in the same category of dystopian fiction as Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World,[31] with the added feature of confronting patriarchy, a categorization that Atwood has accepted and reiterated in many articles and interviews.[37] Even today, many reviewers hold that Atwood's novel remains as foreboding and powerful as ever, largely because of its basis in historical fact.[38][39] Yet when her book was first published in 1985, not all reviewers were convinced of the "cautionary tale" Atwood presented. For example, Mary McCarthy's New York Times review argued that The Handmaid's Tale lacked the "surprised recognition" necessary for readers to see "our present selves in a distorting mirror, of what we may be turning into if current trends are allowed to continue".[40]

text: Feminist reading[edit]

text: Much of the discussion about The Handmaid's Tale has centered on its categorization as feminist literature. Atwood does not see the Republic of Gilead as a purely feminist dystopia, as not all men have greater rights than women.[16] Instead, this society presents a typical dictatorship: "shaped like a pyramid, with the powerful of both sexes at the apex, the men generally outranking the women at the same level; then descending levels of power and status with men and women in each, all the way down to the bottom, where the unmarried men must serve in the ranks before being awarded an Econowife".[16] Additionally, Atwood has argued that while some of the observations that informed the content of The Handmaid's Tale may be feminist, her novel is not meant to say "one thing to one person" or serve as a political message—instead, The Handmaid's Tale is "a study of power, and how it operates and how it deforms or shapes the people who are living within that kind of regime".[31][37] Some scholars have offered such a feminist interpretation, however, connecting Atwood's use of religious fundamentalism in the pages of The Handmaid's Tale to a condemnation of their presence in current American society.[41][42] Yet others have argued that The Handmaid's Tale critiques typical notions of feminism, as Atwood's novel appears to subvert the traditional "women helping women" ideals of the movement and turn toward the possibility of "the matriarchal network ... and a new form of misogyny: women's hatred of women".[43]

text: Awards[edit]

text:
1985 – Governor General's Award for English language fiction (winner)
1986 – Booker Prize (nominated)
1986 – Nebula Award (nominated)
1987 – Arthur C. Clarke Award (winner)[a]
1987 – Prometheus Award (nominated)[b]

tag: ul

text: Academic reception[edit]

text: Atwood's novels, and especially her works of speculative fiction The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake, are frequently offered as examples for the final, open-ended question on the North American Advanced Placement English Literature and Composition exam each year.[44] As such, her books are often assigned in high-school classrooms to students taking this Advanced Placement course, despite the mature themes the work presents. Atwood herself has expressed surprise that her books are being assigned to high-school audiences, largely due to her own censored education in the 1950s, but she has assured readers that this increased attention from high-school students has not altered the material she has chosen to write about since.[45]

text: Many people have expressed discontent at The Handmaid's Tale's presence in the classroom, as it has been frequently challenged or banned over the last 30 years. Some of these challenges have come from parents concerned about the explicit sexuality and other adult themes represented in the book. Others have argued that The Handmaid's Tale depicts a negative view of religion, a view supported by several academics who propose that Atwood's work satirizes contemporary religious fundamentalists in the United States, offering a feminist critique of the trends this movement to the Right represents.[41][42]

text: The American Library Association (ALA) lists The Handmaid's Tale as number 37 on the "100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990–2000".[46] Atwood participated in discussing The Handmaid's Tale as the subject of an ALA discussion series titled "One Book, One Conference".[47]

text: Some complaints have included:

text:
1990: Challenged at Rancho Cotate High School, Rohnert Park, California, as too explicit for students.
1992: Challenged in schools in Waterloo, Iowa, reportedly because of profanity, lurid passages about sex, and statements defamatory to minorities, God, women, and the disabled.
1993: Removed because of profanity and sex from the Chicopee, Massachusetts, high-school English class reading list.
1998: Challenged for use in Richland, Washington, high-school English classes, along with six other titles determined to be "poor quality literature and [that] stress suicide, illicit sex, violence, and hopelessness".
1999: Challenged because of graphic sex, but retained on the advanced placement English list, at George D. Chamberlain High School in Tampa, Florida.
2000: Downgraded from "required" to "optional" on the summer reading list for eleventh graders in the Upper Moreland School District near Philadelphia due to "age-inappropriate" subject matter.
2001: Challenged, but retained, in the Dripping Springs, Texas, senior Advanced Placement English course as an optional reading assignment. Some parents were offended by the book's descriptions of sexual encounters.
2006: Initially banned by Superintendent Ed Lyman from an advanced placement English curriculum in the Judson independent school district in Texas, after a parent complained. Lyman had overruled the recommendation of a committee of teachers, students, and parents; the committee appealed the decision to the school board, which overturned his ban.[48]

text: According to Education Reporter Kristin Rushowy of the Toronto Star (16 January 2009), in 2008 a parent in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, wrote a letter to his son's high school principal, asking that the book no longer be assigned as required reading, stating that the novel is "rife with brutality towards and mistreatment of women (and men at times), sexual scenes, and bleak depression".[49] Rushowy quotes the response of Russell Morton Brown, a retired University of Toronto English professor, who acknowledged that

text: "The Handmaid's Tale wasn't likely written for 17-year-olds, but neither are a lot of things we teach in high school, like Shakespeare... And they are all the better for reading it. They are on the edge of adulthood already, and there's no point in coddling them," he said, adding, "they aren't coddled in terms of mass media today anyway"... He said the book has been accused of being anti-Christian and, more recently, anti-Islamic because the women are veiled and polygamy is allowed... But that "misses the point", said Brown. "It's really anti-fundamentalism."[49]

text: In her earlier account (14 January 2009), Rushowy reported that a Toronto District School Board committee was "reviewing the novel". While noting that "The Handmaid's Tale is listed as one of the 100 'most frequently challenged books' from 1990 to 1999 on the American Library Association's website", Rushowy reports that "The Canadian Library Association says there is 'no known instance of a challenge to this novel in Canada' but says the book was called anti-Christian and pornographic by parents after being placed on a reading list for secondary students in Texas in the 1990s."[50]

text: In November 2012 two parents in Guilford County, North Carolina protested against inclusion of the book on a required reading list at a local high school. The parents presented the school board with a petition signed by 2,300 people, prompting a review of the book by the school's media advisory committee. According to local news reports, one of the parents said "she felt Christian students are bullied in society, in that they're made to feel uncomfortable about their beliefs by non-believers. She said including books like The Handmaid's Tale contributes to that discomfort, because of its negative view on religion and its anti-biblical attitudes toward sex."[51]

text: Other use in academia[edit]

text: In institutions of higher education, professors have found The Handmaid's Tale to be useful, largely because of its historical and religious basis and Atwood's captivating delivery. The novel's teaching points include: introducing politics and the social sciences to students in a more concrete way;[52][53] demonstrating the importance of reading to our freedom, both intellectual and political;[54] and acknowledging the "most insidious and violent manifestations of power in Western history" in a compelling manner.[55] The chapter entitled "Historical Notes" at the end of the novel also represents a warning to academics who run the risk of misreading and misunderstanding historical texts, pointing to the satirized Professor Pieixoto as an example of a male scholar who has taken over and overpowered Offred's narrative with his own interpretation.[56]

text: In other media[edit]

text: Film[edit]

text: The 1990 film The Handmaid's Tale was based on a screenplay by Harold Pinter and directed by Volker Schlöndorff. It stars Natasha Richardson as Offred, Faye Dunaway as Serena Joy, and Robert Duvall as The Commander (Fred).

text: Television[edit]

text: Hulu has produced a 10-episode series of the novel starring Elisabeth Moss as Offred. The first three episodes were released on April 26, 2017, with subsequent episodes following on a weekly basis. Margaret Atwood served as consulting producer.[57] The show has been renewed for a second season, coming out in early 2018.

text: Radio[edit]

text:
A dramatic adaptation of the novel for radio was produced for BBC Radio 4 by John Dryden in 2000.
A Canadian dramatic adaptation for radio was written by playwright Michael O'Brien and produced on CBC Radio in 2002.

text: Audio[edit]

text:
An audiobook of the unabridged text, read by Claire Danes (ISBN 9781491519110), won the 2013 Audie Award for fiction.[58]
In 2014, Canadian band Lakes of Canada released their album Transgressions, which is intended to be a concept album inspired by The Handmaid's Tale.[59]

text: Stage[edit]

text:
The very first authorized stage adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale was written and directed by Bruce G. Shapiro and performed at Tufts Arena Theater, Tufts University, in 1989. The late actress Molly Glynn played "Offred." The production was very well received and highly regarded.[60]
An operatic adaptation, The Handmaid's Tale, by Poul Ruders, premiered in Copenhagen on 6 March 2000, and was performed by the English National Opera, in London, in 2003.[61] It was the opening production of the 2004–2005 season of the Canadian Opera Company.[62]
A stage adaptation of the novel, by Brendon Burns, for the Haymarket Theatre, Basingstoke, England, toured the UK in 2002.[63]
A ballet adaptation choreographed by Lila York and produced by the Royal Winnipeg Ballet premiered on 16 October 2013. Amanda Green appeared as Offred and Alexander Gamayunov as The Commander.[64]
A one-woman stage show, adapted from the novel, by Joseph Stollenwerk premiered in the U.S. in January 2015.[65]


document_title: Earth's energy budget

question_text: energy provided directly from earth's interior is called

question_tokens: energy provided directly from earth 's interior is called

text: Earth's energy budget

text: Energy budget[edit]

text: In spite of the enormous transfers of energy into and from the Earth, it maintains a relatively constant temperature because, as a whole, there is few net gain or loss: Earth emits via atmospheric and terrestrial radiation (shifted to longer electromagnetic wavelengths) to space the about same amount of energy as it receives via insolation (all forms of electromagnetic radiation).

text: To quantify Earth's heat budget or heat balance, let the insolation received at the top of the atmosphere be 100 units (100 units=about 1,360 watts per square meter facing the sun), as shown in the accompanying illustration. Called the albedo of Earth, around 35 units are reflected back to space: 27 from the top of clouds, 2 from snow and ice-covered areas, and 6 by other parts of the atmosphere. The 65 remaining units are absorbed: 14 within the atmosphere and 51 by the Earth’s surface. These 51 units are radiated to space in the form of terrestrial radiation: 17 directly radiated to space and 34 absorbed by the atmosphere (19 through latent heat of condensation, 9 via convection and turbulence, and 6 directly absorbed). The 48 units absorbed by the atmosphere (34 units from terrestrial radiation and 14 from insolation) are finally radiated back to space. These 65 units (17 from the ground and 48 from the atmosphere) balance the 65 units absorbed from the sun in order to maintain zero net gain of energy by the Earth.[8]

text: Incoming radiant energy (shortwave)[edit]

text: The total amount of energy received per second at the top of Earth's atmosphere (TOA) is measured in watts and is given by the solar constant times the cross-sectional area of the Earth. Because the surface area of a sphere is four times the cross-sectional surface area of a sphere (i.e. the area of a circle), the average TOA flux is one quarter of the solar constant and so is approximately 340 W/m².[1][9] Since the absorption varies with location as well as with diurnal, seasonal and annual variations, the numbers quoted are long-term averages, typically averaged from multiple satellite measurements.[1]

text: Of the ~340 W/m² of solar radiation received by the Earth, an average of ~77 W/m² is reflected back to space by clouds and the atmosphere and ~23 W/m² is reflected by the surface albedo, leaving ~240 W/m² of solar energy input to the Earth's energy budget. This gives the earth a mean net albedo of 0.29.[1]

text: Earth's internal heat and other small effects[edit]

text: The geothermal heat flux from the Earth's interior is estimated to be 47 terawatts.[10] This comes to 0.087 watt/square metre, which represents only 0.027% of Earth's total energy budget at the surface, which is dominated by 173,000 terawatts of incoming solar radiation.[11]

text: Human production of energy is even lower, at an estimated 18 TW.

text: Photosynthesis has a larger effect: photosynthetic efficiency turns up to 2% of incoming sunlight into biomass, for an estimated 70 TW absorbed round the year[citation needed].

text: Other minor sources of energy are usually ignored in these calculations, including accretion of interplanetary dust and solar wind, light from stars other than the Sun and the thermal radiation from space. Earlier, Joseph Fourier had claimed that deep space radiation was significant in a paper often cited as the first on the greenhouse effect.[12]

text: Longwave radiation[edit]

text: Longwave radiation is usually defined as outgoing infrared energy leaving the planet. However, the atmosphere absorbs parts initially, or cloud cover can reflect radiation. Generally, heat energy is transported between the planet's surface layers (land and ocean) to the atmosphere, transported via evapotranspiration and latent heat fluxes or conduction/convection processes.[1] Ultimately, energy is radiated in the form of longwave infrared radiation back into space.

text: Recent satellite observations indicate additional precipitation, which is sustained by increased energy leaving the surface through evaporation (the latent heat flux), offsetting increases in longwave flux to the surface.[5]

text: Earth's energy imbalance[edit]

text: If the incoming energy flux is not equal to the outgoing energy flux, net heat is added to or lost by the planet (if the incoming flux is larger or smaller than the outgoing respectively).

text: Indirect measurement[edit]

text: An imbalance must show in something on Earth warming or cooling (depending on the direction of the imbalance), and the ocean being the larger thermal reservoir on Earth, is a prime candidate for measurements.

text: Earth's energy imbalance measurements provided by Argo floats have detected an accumulation of ocean heat content (OHC). The estimated imbalance was measured during a deep solar minimum of 2005-2010 to be 0.58 ± 0.15 W/m².[13] Later research estimated the surface energy imbalance to be 0.60 ± 0.17 W/m².[14]

text: Direct measurement[edit]

text: Several satellites indirectly measure the energy absorbed and radiated by Earth and by inference the energy imbalance. The NASA Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) project involves three such satellites: the Earth Radiation Budget Satellite (ERBS), launched October 1984; NOAA-9, launched December 1984; and NOAA-10, launched September 1986.[15]

text: Today NASA's satellite instruments, provided by CERES, part of the NASA's Earth Observing System (EOS), are designed to measure both solar-reflected and Earth-emitted radiation.[16]

text: Natural greenhouse effect[edit]

text: The major atmospheric gases (oxygen and nitrogen) are transparent to incoming sunlight but are also transparent to outgoing thermal (infrared) radiation. However, water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane and other trace gases are opaque to many wavelengths of thermal radiation. The Earth's surface radiates the net equivalent of 17 percent of the incoming solar energy in the form of thermal infrared. However, the amount that directly escapes to space is only about 12 percent of incoming solar energy. The remaining fraction, 5 to 6 percent, is absorbed by the atmosphere by greenhouse gas molecules.[17]

text: When greenhouse gas molecules absorb thermal infrared energy, their temperature rises. Those gases then radiate an increased amount of thermal infrared energy in all directions. Heat radiated upward continues to encounter greenhouse gas molecules; those molecules also absorb the heat, and their temperature rises and the amount of heat they radiate increases. The atmosphere thins with altitude, and at roughly 5–6 kilometres, the concentration of greenhouse gases in the overlying atmosphere is so thin that heat can escape to space.[17]

text: Because greenhouse gas molecules radiate infrared energy in all directions, some of it spreads downward and ultimately returns to the Earth's surface, where it is absorbed. The Earth's surface temperature is thus higher than it would be if it were heated only by direct solar heating. This supplemental heating is the natural greenhouse effect.[17] It is as if the Earth is covered by a blanket that allows high frequency radiation (sunlight) to enter, but slows the rate at which the low frequency infrared radiant energy emitted by the Earth leaves.

text: Climate sensitivity[edit]

text: A change in the incident radiated portion of the energy budget is referred to as a radiative forcing.

text: Climate sensitivity is the steady state change in the equilibrium temperature as a result of changes in the energy budget.

text: Climate forcings and global warming[edit]

text: Climate forcings are changes that cause temperatures to rise or fall, disrupting the energy balance. Natural climate forcings include changes in the Sun's brightness, Milankovitch cycles (small variations in the shape of Earth's orbit and its axis of rotation that occur over thousands of years) and volcanic eruptions that inject light-reflecting particles as high as the stratosphere. Man-made forcings include particle pollution (aerosols) that absorb and reflect incoming sunlight; deforestation, which changes how the surface reflects and absorbs sunlight; and the rising concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, which decreases the rate at which heat is radiated to space.

text: A forcing can trigger feedbacks that intensify (positive feedback) or weaken (negative feedback) the original forcing. For example, loss of ice at the poles, which makes them less reflective, causes greater absorption of energy and so increases the rate at which the ice melts, is an example of a positive feedback.[18]

text: The observed planetary energy imbalance during the recent solar minimum shows that solar forcing of climate, although natural and significant, is overwhelmed by anthropogenic climate forcing.[19]

text: In 2012, NASA scientists reported that to stop global warming atmospheric CO2 content would have to be reduced to 350 ppm or less, assuming all other climate forcings were fixed. The impact of anthropogenic aerosols has not been quantified, but individual aerosol types are thought to have substantial heating and cooling effects.[13]


document_title: Tennis Court Oath

question_text: what was the oath of the tennis court

question_tokens: what was the oath of the tennis court

text: Tennis Court Oath

text: On June 20th, 1789, the members of the French Estates-General for the Third Estate, who had begun to call themselves the National Assembly, took the Tennis Court Oath (French: Serment du Jeu de Paume), vowing "not to separate, and to reassemble wherever circumstances require, until the constitution of the kingdom is established." It was a pivotal event in the early days of the French Revolution.

text: The Estates-General had been called to address the country's fiscal and agricultural crisis, but immediately after convening in May 1789, they had become bogged down in issues of representation—particularly, whether they would vote by head (which would increase the power of the Third Estate) or by order.[why?]

text: On 17 June, the Third Estate, led by the comte de Mirabeau, began to call themselves the National Assembly.[1] On the morning of 20 June, the deputies were shocked to discover that the chamber door was locked and guarded by soldiers. Immediately fearing the worst and anxious that a royal attack by King Louis XVI was imminent, the deputies congregated in a nearby indoor Jeu de paume court in the Saint-Louis district of the city of Versailles, near the Palace of Versailles.

text: There, 576 of the 577 members from the Third Estate took a collective oath "not to separate, and to reassemble wherever circumstances require, until the constitution of the kingdom is established".[2] The only person who did not join was Joseph Martin-Dauch from Castelnaudary, who would only execute decisions made by the king.[3]

text: Background[edit]

text: Before the Revolution, French society—aside from royalty—was divided into three Estates. The First Estate comprised the clergy; the Second Estate was the nobility. The entire rest of France—some 97% of the population—was the Third Estate, which ranged from very wealthy city merchants to impoverished rural farmers. The three estates met from time to time in the Estates General, a legislative assembly.[4]

text: Although the Third Estate was the overwhelming majority of the French population, the makeup of the Estates General was such that the Third Estate comprised a bare majority of the delegates.[citation needed] A simple majority was sufficient—as long as the delegates' votes were cast all together. The First and Second Estates preferred to divide the vote in some way. A proposal might need to receive approval from each Estate, or there might be two "houses" of the Estates General (one for the first two Estates, and one for the Third), and a bill would need to be passed by both houses. Either way, the First and Second Estate could exercise veto power over proposals enjoying widespread support among the Third Estate, but not the others, such as reforms that threatened the privileges of the nobility and clergy.[clarification needed]

text: Significance[edit]

text: This oath would come to have major significance in the revolution as the Third Estate would constantly continue to protest to have more representation.[5] Some historians have argued that, given political tensions in France at that time, the deputies' fears, even if wrong, were reasonable and that the importance of the oath goes above and beyond its context.[6]

text: The oath was both a revolutionary act, and an assertion that political authority derived from the people and their representatives rather than from the monarch himself. Their solidarity forced Louis XVI to order the clergy and the nobility to join with the Third Estate in the National Assembly in order to give the illusion that he controlled the National Assembly.[1] This oath would prove vital to the Third Estate as a step of protest that would eventually lead to more power in the Estates General, and every governing body thereafter.[7]

text: The Oath signified for the first time that French citizens formally stood in opposition to Louis XVI, and the National Assembly's refusal to back down forced the king to make concessions. It was foreshadowed by, and drew considerably from, the 1776 United States Declaration of Independence, especially the preamble. The Oath also inspired a wide variety of revolutionary activity in the months afterwards, ranging from rioting across the French countryside to renewed calls for a written French constitution. Likewise, it reinforced the Assembly's strength and forced the King to formally request that voting occur based on head, not power.[citation needed] The Tennis Court Oath, which was taken in June 1789, preceded the 4 August 1789 abolition of feudalism and the 26 August 1789 Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen.


document_title: Driving licence in India

question_text: minimum age for 4 wheeler driving licence in india

text: Driving licence in India

text: Background[edit]

text: Applications for a provisional driving licence can be made from the age of 16. Valid for driving a moped or gearless motorcycle (with a capacity of up to 50 cc) from aged 16,[1] and a car from aged 16 or older to drive any other type of vehicle.[2] The common "All India Permit" allows the licensee to drive throughout the country.[3] For driving commercial/transport vehicles, one should obtain endorsement (and a minimum age of 20 years, in some states) in the driving licence to effect under s.3(1) of The Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. Until a driving test (which consists of three sections: verbal or written test (depending on the state), road sign test followed by a supervised driving examination)[4] has been passed a driver may hold only a provisional licence and be subject to certain conditions.

text: The conditions attached to provisional licences of a particular category of vehicle are:[2]

text:
L-plates must be conspicuously displayed on the front and rear of the vehicle.
Learner drivers of a particular category and transmission type of vehicle must be accompanied by somebody who has held a full driving licence for that category and transmission type, except in the case of solo motorcycles and vehicles of certain categories designed solely for one person.
Motorcycle riders must not carry any pillion passenger.
Bus drivers must not carry any passenger except a person giving or receiving instruction.

text: After passing a driving test, the provisional licence may be surrendered in exchange for a full Indian licence for the relevant kind of vehicle. Full car licences allow use of mopeds, motorcycles and cars.

text: A licence if valid for 20 years from the date of issue or till the licence holders turns 50 years of age, whichever happens earlier. The driving licence is required to be renewed after expiry of its validity.[5]

text: Theory testing[edit]

text: Tests on basic driving rules are conducted at the RTOs when an individual applies for provisional licence. The theoretical test in India consists of basic road sign questions, which are the same for car and motorcycle tests:

text:
Multiple choice questions – 20 questions with a choice of possible answers. At least 12 questions should be answered correctly to pass this section.
Verbal or written test (depending on the state)

text: The theory test are completed on the computer, and both must be passed in order to pass the theory test.

text: Driving licence categories[edit]

text: This is a list of the categories that might be found on a driving licence in India.

text:
MC 50CC (Motorcycle 50cc) — motorcycles with an engine capacity of 50 cc or less.
MC EX50CC (Motorcycle more than 50cc) — motorcycles and (Light Motor Vehicle)CAR.
FVG—Motorcycles of any engine capacity, but without gears, including mopeds and scooters
MC With Gear or M/CYCL.WG (Motorcycle With Gear) — all motorcycles.
LMV (Light Motor Vehicle) — including motorcars, jeeps, taxis, delivery vans.
LMV-NT (Light Motor Vehicle—Non Transport) — for personal use only
LMV-TR (Light Motor Vehicle—Transport) — for commercial transportation including light goods carrier.[6]
HMV (Heavy Motor Vehicle)
HPMV (Heavy Passenger Motor Vehicle)
HTV Heavy Transport Vehicle (Heavy Goods Motor Vehicle, Heavy Passenger Motor Vehicle)
TRAILOR — a person holding a heavy vehicle driving licence can only apply for heavy trailor licence

text: Most of the legislation regarding licensing is in the Rules of the Road Regulation and the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988. Private/Commercial drivers should have an additional Badge if they are driving a taxi or any other public transport vehicle.scout

text: Points and endorsements[edit]

text: India uses cumulative points systems, broadly similar but different in detail in different countries, for offenders.

text: Points are given for driving offences by law courts, and the licence is endorsed accordingly. An Indian driving licence may be endorsed by the courts for various offences, not only for those committed whilst driving or in charge of a vehicle.[citation needed] If the individual committing the offence does not hold a valid driving licence the driver is subject to be penalised or face imprisonment of up to 3 months.[7] Violation of traffic signals, triple driving on motor cycle, using vehicles without registration or in unsafe condition may endorse and attract 3 negative points in each case.[8]

text: In case of two-wheelers, helmet laws is mandatory for the main rider and the pillion rider. Offences such as for drink or drug driving are recorded on the licence and the offender is prosecuted and imprisoned.[9]

text: Twelve points on the licence makes the driver liable to cancellation/suspension of driving licence for one year; accumulation of twelve points for the second consecutive time would lead to suspension of driving licence for five years.[8]

text: Production[edit]

text: Drivers are legally obliged to carry a valid driving licence while driving. Under s.130 of Motor Vehicles Act, 1988; A police officer or any other official authorised by the government can ask for vehicle-related documents, and the driver should produce them within 15 days at the police station (or the concerned department).[10]

text: The law permits officials to seize a licence, and issue a temporary one for a specified time. The law also allows the state government to set the fines or prison terms for minor traffic violations, and specifies who has the rights to enforce these rules.

text: Every driving licence has a maximum number of endorsements allowed. If the driver does not follow the traffic rules or causes any fault, then a penalty fine is issued and an endorsement put on the licence. An excessive number of endorsements may lead to cancellation.[8]


document_title: Me, Myself & Irene

question_text: where did me myself and irene take place

text: Me, Myself & Irene

text: Plot[edit]

text: Charlie Baileygates (Jim Carrey) is a veteran Rhode Island State Police trooper who has been taken advantage of by those around him, starting with his former wife Layla (Traylor Howard). Despite his friends warning him of Layla's infidelity, Charlie refused to accept she was in an affair, even after she gave birth to triplet black boys, until she ran off with her midget genius black lover, Shonté, abandoning her children. In the present, Charlie has raised the triplets as his own, Jamal, Lee Harvey, and Shonté Jr (Anthony Anderson, Jerod Mixon, Mongo Brownlee), likewise geniuses, but huge in size as compared to their biological father. While Charlie is consistently loved and respected by his "sons", he is continually abused by the rest of the town, who see him as a stupid coward whom anyone can easily walk over. As a result of years of such treatment, Charlie develops a split personality named Hank to deal with the confrontations Charlie avoids. Emerging whenever Charlie is under extreme stress, Hank is an over-the-top, rude, and violent persona reminiscent of characters played by Clint Eastwood.[2] A psychiatrist prescribes medication to keep Charlie's Hank personality at bay.

text: Believing that Charlie needs a vacation, his commanding officer (Robert Forster) orders him to escort Irene Waters (Renée Zellweger) from Rhode Island to Massena, New York, because she reportedly committed a hit-and-run. Irene insists the hit-and-run accusation is a lie told by Dickie (Daniel Greene), her mob-connected ex-boyfriend, and by corrupt police officers in his employ, to keep her from revealing Dickie's illegal activities to the proper authorities. In Massena, Charlie prepares to turn over Irene to two United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) agents, when a hitman with a contract on Irene's life attempts to assassinate her, killing one of the EPA agents. Charlie keeps Irene safe, and they flee, accidentally leaving his medication behind, allowing the Hank personality to emerge frequently. Meanwhile, the FBI suspects that Charlie is responsible for the murder of the EPA agent. FBI agents begin pursuing him and Irene, as do crooked police officers in Dickie's pay, Boshane (Richard Jenkins) and Gerke (Chris Cooper). The chase becomes a media spectacle, alerting Charlie's sons to his predicament.

text: Charlie and Irene decide to return to Rhode Island, developing a bond along the way. Though Irene is taken by Charlie's personality, the frequent emergences by Hank worry her, though his more aggressive personality keeps them out of trouble. Along the way they pick up Casper aka "Whitey" (Michael Bowman), an albino waiter from a restaurant who claims he killed his entire family in the past. While stopping at a motel, Charlie discovers how he might be able to suppress Hank and goes to have a conversation with Irene about it, and they sleep together. The next morning, Hank reveals that actually it was he who slept with Irene. In the confusion, they are almost ambushed by Boshane and Gerke, but Charlie's sons, having found them, create a distraction, stealing a police helicopter, they call in a false report, stating Charlie and Irene have been spotted in the woods nearby, allowing Charlie and Irene to leave without knowing about the police who had left before they exited their room, leaving Casper behind.

text: They board a train back to Rhode Island. Dickie boards the same train, unable to rely on his henchmen to stop Charlie and Irene. He kidnaps her, and Charlie gives chase, working together with Hank to save her. Hank then appears to try to stop Charlie from rescuing her, but Charlie finally stands up for himself against his own fears, thus permanently nullifying Hank for good. As Charlie tries to wrestle her back and disarm Dickie on a bridge, Dickie shoots off his thumb. Dickie is then hit from behind by a lawn dart thrown by Casper, killing him. Charlie and Irene fall from the bridge into a river below, where Charlie's sons arrive to help rescue them. Regrouping with Casper, Charlie apologizes for making him kill again, but Casper reveals he made up his backstory due to the fact that Charlie talked too much at the motel and scared him. The police arrive but quickly learn of Irene's plight and the corrupt cops working for Dickie. Gerke is arrested, Charlie is congratulated for bringing him to justice, and Irene is cleared of the charges against her.

text: Irene prepares to leave Rhode Island when she is pulled over by the police, but this proves only to be a diversion to allow Charlie to propose marriage to her, which she happily accepts.

text: The post-credits scene sees everyone looking for Charlie's thumb in the river, Whitey finds it but a fish eats it.

text: Cast[edit]

text:
Jim Carrey as Charlie Baileygates/Hank Evans
Renée Zellweger as Irene P. Waters
Chris Cooper as Lt. Gerke
Robert Forster as Colonel Partington
Richard Jenkins as Agent Boshane
Zen Gesner as Agent Peterson
Michael Bowman as Casper ("Whitey")
Rob Moran as Trooper Finneran
Daniel Greene as Dickie Thurman
Anthony Anderson as Jamal Baileygates

Jeremy Maleek Leggett as 9-year-old Jamal Baileygates

Mongo Brownlee as Lee Harvey Baileygates

Andrew Phillips as 9-year-old Lee Harvey Baileygates

Jerod Mixon as Shonté Jr. Baileygates

Justin Chandler as 9-year-old Shonté Jr. Baileygates

Tony Cox as Shonté
Steve Tyler as Delivery Room Doctor
Traylor Howard as Layla Baileygates
Richard Tyson as Gun shop owner
Ezra Buzzington as Disabled guy
Shannon Whirry as Breastfeeding mom
Lin Shaye (deleted scenes) as Mrs. Caleron
Lina Teal as Bikini girl
Anna Kournikova, Cam Neely and Brendan Shanahan appear in cameo roles

text: Music [edit]

text: The film's original score was written by Pete Yorn, while the movie's soundtrack contains several covers of Steely Dan songs performed by other bands. Examples are Smash Mouth's cover of "Do It Again", Ben Folds Five's cover of "Barrytown", and Marvelous 3's cover of "Reelin' in the Years". Other songs include "Breakout" by Foo Fighters, "Totalimmortal", originally by AFI but covered by The Offspring, "The World Ain't Slowin' Down" by Ellis Paul, and "Strange Condition" by Pete Yorn.

text:
"I'd Like That" – XTC
"Breakout" – Foo Fighters
"Do It Again"+ – Smash Mouth
"Deep Inside of You" – Third Eye Blind
"Totalimmortal" – The Offspring
"The World Ain't Slowin' Down" – Ellis Paul
"Any Major Dude Will Tell You"+ – Wilco
"Only A Fool Would Say That"+ – Ivy
"Can't Find The Time To Tell You" – Hootie & The Blowfish
"Bodhisattva"+ – Brian Setzer Orchestra
"Bad Sneakers"+ – The Push Stars
"Reelin' In The Years"+ – Marvelous 3
"Strange Condition" – Pete Yorn
"Barrytown"+ – Ben Folds Five
"Razor Boy"+ – Billy Goodrum
"Where He Can Hide" – Tom Wolfe

tag: ol

text: +Steely Dan cover

text: "Motherfucker" by The Dwarves, "Fire Like This" by Hardknox, "Don't Say You Don't Remember" by Beverly Bremers, "The Perpetrator" by Hipster Daddy-O and the Handgrenades, and "Hem of Your Garment" by Cake were included in the movie but not on the soundtrack. Pete Yorn's, Just Another can also be heard it the background, during the scene where they discuss Hank's Idea. Alta Mira's "El Capitan" can be heard in the background, during the scene where Hank fights himself at the train station. Other songs, that appeared in the film are not included on the soundtrack album.

text: Reception[edit]

text: Box office[edit]

text: The film opened at #1 on the weekend of June 23, 2000 making US$24.2 million in its opening weekend. The film earned $90,570,999 in the United States, and a further $58,700,000 internationally for a worldwide total of $149,270,999.

text: Critical response [edit]

text: This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it. (November 2015)

tag: table

text: Review website Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a score of 48%, based on 97 reviews, and an average rating of 5.4/10, with the consensus that "While Jim Carrey's comedic skills earn some laughs, Me, Myself and Irene sports a tired, unsatisfying plot."[3]


document_title: Bristlecone pine

question_text: where is the oldest bristlecone pine tree located

text: Bristlecone pine

text: Species and range[edit]

text: There are three closely related species of bristlecone pines:

text:
Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) in Utah, Nevada and eastern California. The famous longest-lived species; often the term Bristlecone pine refers to this tree in particular.
Rocky Mountains bristlecone pine (Pinus aristata) in Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. The most populous species; capable of forming closed canopies and, unlike the other two, is commonly cultivated.[citation needed]
Foxtail pine (Pinus balfouriana) with two disjunct populations found in the Klamath Mountains (subspecies balfouriana) and the southern Sierra Nevada[5] (subspecies austrina). A small outlying population was reported in southern Oregon, but was proven to have been misidentified.[6] Forms the thickest groves of the three.

text: At least some of the three species can hybridize in cultivation, but the ranges of wild populations do not overlap. The Colorado River and Green River produces a 160-mile (260 km) gap between the ranges of P. longaeva and P. aristata and the northern Owens Valley provides a 19-mile (30 km) gap between the ranges of P. longaeva and P. balfouriana.[7]

text: Description[edit]

text: Bristlecone pines grow in isolated groves just below the tree line, between 5,600 and 11,200 ft (1,700 and 3,400 m) elevation on dolomitic soils.[4] The trees grow in soils that are shallow lithosols, usually derived from dolomite and sometimes limestone, and occasionally sandstone or quartzite soils. Dolomite soils are alkaline, high in calcium and magnesium, and low in phosphorus. Those factors tend to exclude other plant species, allowing bristlecones to thrive.[8] Because of cold temperatures, dry soils, high winds, and short growing seasons, the trees grow very slowly. Even the tree's needles, which grow in bunches of five, can remain on the tree for forty years, which gives the tree's terminal branches the unique appearance of a long bottle brush.

text: The bristlecone pine's root system is mostly composed of highly branched, shallow roots, while a few large, branching roots provide structural support. The bristlecone pine is extremely drought tolerant due to its branched shallow root system, its waxy needles, and thick needle cuticles that aid in water retention.[7]

text: The wood is very dense and resinous, and thus resistant to invasion by insects, fungi, and other potential pests. The tree's longevity is due in part to the wood's extreme durability. While other species of trees that grow nearby suffer rot, bare bristlecone pines can endure, even after death, often still standing on their roots, for many centuries. Rather than rot, exposed wood, on living and dead trees, erodes like stone due to wind, rain, and freezing, which creates unusual forms and shapes.

text: The bristlecone pine has an intrinsically low rate of reproduction and regeneration, and it is thought that under present climatic and environmental conditions the rate of regeneration may be insufficient to sustain its population.[9] The species are on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list.[9] The species are labeled under Least Concern (LC). The justification for this being that no subpopulations for Great Basin bristlecone pines are decreasing. Subpopulations seem to be increasing or remaining stable.[9] Many bristlecone pine habitats have been protected, including the Inyo National Forest's Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest in the White Mountains of California and the Great Basin National Park in Nevada,[10][11] where cutting or gathering wood is prohibited.[10]

text: The green pine needles give the twisted branches a bottle-brush appearance. The needles of the tree surround the branch an extent of about one foot near the tip of the limb.[12] The name bristlecone pine refers to the dark purple female cones that bear incurved prickles on their surface.[4][11] The dark color of these cones help to absorb heat. After maturity, which takes about two years, the cones will become brown in color.[12] These ancient trees have a gnarled and stunted appearance, especially those found at high altitudes,[7] and have reddish-brown bark with deep fissures.[13] As the tree ages, much of its vascular cambium layer may die. In very old specimens, often only a narrow strip of living tissue connects the roots to a handful of live branches. Even though the trees' needles may age, they still remain functional in regulating water and by their ability to photosynthesize.[7]

text: Oldest living organisms[edit]

text: Bristlecone pines are known for attaining great ages. A specimen of Pinus longaeva located in the White Mountains of California is 7003506700000000000♠5,067 years old according to measurements by Tom Harlan.[1] This is the oldest known individual tree in the world. The identity of the specimen is being kept secret by Harlan. Another well-known bristlecone from the White Mountains is Methuselah which is 7003484900000000000♠4,849 years old. Its specific location is also being kept secret.[14]

text: The other two species, Pinus balfouriana and Pinus aristata are also long-lived, though not to the extreme extent of P. longaeva; specimens of both have been measured or estimated to be up to 3,000 years old.[15] It is believed that the longevity of the trees is related to the proportion of dead wood to live wood. This high ratio reduces respiration and water loss, thereby extending the life of the tree.[9]

text: Note that trees that reproduce via cloning can be considered to be much older than bristlecone pines. A colony of 47,000 quaking aspen trees (nicknamed "Pando"), covering 106 acres (43 ha) in the Fishlake National Forest of the United States, has been estimated to be 80,000 years old, although tree ring samples date individual, above-ground, trees at only an average of about 130 years.[16][17]

text: The bristlecone pine is invaluable to dendroclimatologists, because it provides the longest continual climatically sensitive tree-ring chronologies on the planet. By cross-dating millennia-old bristlecone pine debris, some chronologies reach beyond 9,000 years before present.[7] In addition, ratios of stable carbon isotopes from bristlecone pine tree rings are sensitive to past variations in moisture availability. This information can be used to reconstruct precipitation changes in the past.[18]

text: The Rocky Mountain population is severely threatened by an introduced fungal disease known as white pine blister rust, and by pine beetles.[19] Another problem that the species face is climate change as temperatures have increased 0.5–1 °C within the past 30 years throughout the southern Rocky Mountain range. These changes in climate would mostly affect trees in higher elevations. With these problems, the genetic diversity within the species has become a concern.[20] It is noted that old specimens have, however, survived previous warmer periods.


document_title: Coat of arms of South Africa

question_text: who designed the south african coat of arms

text: Coat of arms of South Africa

text: History[edit]

text: The design process was initiated when, in 1999, the Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology requested ideas for the new coat-of-arms from the public. A brief was then prepared based on the ideas received, along with input from the Cabinet. The Government Communication and Information System then approached Design South Africa to brief ten of the top designers. Three designers were chosen to present their concepts to the Cabinet. Iaan Bekker's design was chosen.

text: The new arms were introduced on Freedom Day, 27 April 2000. The change reflected government's aim to highlight the democratic change in South Africa and a new sense of patriotism.

text: The coat of arms is a series of elements organised in distinct symmetric egg-like or oval shapes placed on top of one another. The completed structure of the coat of arms combines the lower and higher oval shape in a symbol of infinity. The path that connects the lower edge of the scroll, through the lines of the tusks, with the horizon above and the sun rising at the top, forms the shape of the cosmic egg from which the secretary bird rises. In the symbolic sense, this is the implied rebirth of the spirit of the great and heroic nation of South Africa.

text: The coat of arms is also a central part of the Seal of the Republic, traditionally considered to be the highest emblem of the State. Absolute authority is given to every document with an impression of the Seal of the Republic on it, as this means that it has been approved by the President of South Africa. Since 1997, however, the use of the Seal of the Republic has not actually been required by the Constitution, but it continues to be used.

text: Blazon[edit]

text: The official blazon of the arms is:

text: Or, representations of two San human figures of red ochre, statant respectant, the hands of the innermost arms clasped, with upper arm, inner wrist, waist and knee bands Argent, and a narrow border of red ochre; the shield ensigned of a spear and knobkierie in saltire, Sable. Thereabove a demi-secretary bird displayed Or, charged on the breast with a stylised representation of a protea flower with outer petals Vert, inner petals Or and seeded of nine triangles conjoined in three rows, the upper triangle Gules, the second row Vert, Or inverted and Vert, and the third row Vert, Or inverted, Sable, Or inverted and Vert. Above the head of the secretary bird an arc of seven rays facetted Or and Orange, the two outer rays conjoined to the elevated wings.

text: Upon a riband Vert, the motto !KE E: /XARRA //KE in letters Argent. Issuant from the ends of the riband two pairs of elephant tusks curving inwards, the tips conjoined to the wings of the secretary bird, Or, therewithin and flanking the shields, two ears of wheat Brunatré.[2]

text: The oval shape of foundation[edit]

text: The first element is the motto, in a green semicircle. Completing the semicircle are two symmetrically placed pairs of elephant tusks pointing upwards. Within the oval shape formed by the tusks are two symmetrical ears of wheat, that in turn frame a centrally placed gold shield.

text: The shape of the shield makes reference to the drum, and contains two human figures from Khoisan rock art. The figures are depicted facing one another in greeting and in unity.

text: Above the shield are a spear and a knobkierie, crossed in a single unit. These elements are arranged harmoniously to give focus to the shield and complete the lower oval shape of foundation.

text: The motto

text: The ears of wheat

text: Elephant tusks

text: The shield

text: The human figures

text: The spear and knobkierie

text: The oval shape of ascendance[edit]

text: Immediately above the oval shape of foundation, is the visual centre of the coat of arms, a protea. The petals of the protea are rendered in a triangular pattern reminiscent of the crafts of Africa.

text: The secretary bird is placed above the protea and the flower forms the chest of the bird. The secretary bird stands with its wings uplifted in a regal and uprising gesture. The distinctive head feathers of the secretary bird crown a strong and vigilant head. The rising sun above the horizon is placed between the wings of the secretary bird and completes the oval shape of ascendance.

text: The combination of the upper and lower oval shapes intersect to form an unbroken infinite course, and the great harmony between the basic elements result in a dynamic, elegant and thoroughly distinctive design. Yet it clearly retains the stability, gravity and immediacy that a coat of arms demands.

text: The King protea'

text: The secretary bird

text: The rising sun

text: 1910 arms[edit]

text: The first coat of arms was granted by King George V by Royal Warrant on 17 September 1910.[3] This was a few months after the formation of the Union of South Africa.

text: It was a combination of symbols representing the four provinces (formerly colonies) that made up the Union.

text:
The first quarter is the figure of Hope, representing the Colony of the Cape of Good Hope.
The two wildebeests of the second quarter represent the Colony of Natal.
The orange tree in the third quarter was used as the symbol of the Orange Free State Republic.
The wagon in the fourth quarter represented the Transvaal.
The supporters are taken from the arms of the Orange River Colony and the Cape Colony.
The lion holds four rods, bound together, symbolising the unification of the four former colonies.

text: The motto, Ex Unitate Vires was officially translated as "Union is Strength" until 1961, and thereafter as "Unity is Strength".

text: Evolution[edit]

text: Three official renditions of the arms were used. The original rendition (1910) was the only version used until 1930, and it continued to be used as the rank badge of warrant officers in the South African Defence Force and South African National Defence Force until 2002. The second version, painted in 1930 and known as the "ordinary coat of arms", and the third version, painted in 1932 and known as the "embellished coat of arms", were both used until 2000.

text:
1910
1930
1932